While gleeful reports abound that the G.O.P. is disorganized, dispirited and headed to defeat in November, facts have a way of ruining this rosy narrative for the Democrats. Observing Democrats and their supporters in the media (like the author of the New York magazine article), one would think President Obama has already been re-elected – and the actual voting is nothing more than a formality.

Despite such cheerleading, Democrats, not Republicans, should be worried about their prospects this election cycle. One need not look any further than the 2010 midterm election as a barometer as to why Democrats shouldn’t be planning their redecorations of the Oval Office, Congress or the state house following the 2012 contest.

Notwithstanding claims by the president and Democratic leaders, the “stimulus package” and the Affordable Care Act remain deeply unpopular with a majority of the American people. Whether the left believes it or not, voters chose the 2010 midterm elections to rebuke both President Obama and Congressional Democrats for their overreach in dramatically expanding the size and scope of the federal government.

On Nov. 3, 2010, as the dust settled across America, Democrats lost their majority in the House of Representatives and the Republicans gained six seats in the United States Senate – ending the Democrats’ filibuster-proof majority. More dramatically, Democrats were crushed in statehouse elections in 2010.

That year, only 15 Republican incumbents were defeated; Democratic incumbents lost 492 seats. Of the 88 legislative chambers that held elections, Republicans prevailed in 53, and Democrats won only 32.

Voters spoke with their ballots in 2010 to halt the Democrats’ advance. This November, the G.O.P. will march confidently ahead on Election Day. Rather than being down and out, Republicans remain a force to be reckoned with.

I’m with Mr Christie on this.

OR….was 2010 the last gasp of the GoP?

2012 or Never

Republicans are worried this election could be their last chance to stop history. This is fear talking. But not paranoia.

If the various expressions of right-wing hysteria that have flowered over the past three years—goldbuggery, birtherism, death panels at home and imaginary apology tours by President Obama abroad—perhaps the strain that has taken deepest root within mainstream Republican circles is the terror that the achievements of the Obama administration may be irreversible, and that the time remaining to stop permanent nightfall is dwindling away.

“America is approaching a ‘tipping point’ beyond which the Nation will be unable to change course,” announces the dark, old-timey preamble to Paul Ryan’s “The Roadmap Plan,” a statement of fiscal principles that shaped the budget outline approved last spring by 98 percent of the House Republican caucus. Rick Santorum warns his audiences, “We are reaching a tipping point, folks, when those who pay are the minority and those who receive are the majority.” Even such a sober figure as Mitt Romney regularly says things like “We are only inches away from no longer being a free economy,” and that this election “could be our last chance.”

The Republican Party is in the grips of many fever dreams. But this is not one of them. To be sure, the apocalyptic ideological analysis—that “freedom” is incompatible with Clinton-era tax rates and Massachusetts-style health care—is pure crazy. But the panicked strategic analysis, and the sense of urgency it gives rise to, is actually quite sound. The modern GOP—the party of Nixon, Reagan, and both Bushes—is staring down its own demographic extinction. Right-wing warnings of impending tyranny express, in hyperbolic form, well-grounded dread: that conservative America will soon come to be dominated, in a semi-permanent fashion, by an ascendant Democratic coalition hostile to its outlook and interests. And this impending doom has colored the party’s frantic, fearful response to the Obama presidency.

The GOP has reason to be scared. Obama’s election was the vindication of a prediction made several years before by journalist John Judis and political scientist Ruy Teixeira in their 2002 book, The Emerging Democratic Majority. Despite the fact that George W. Bush then occupied the White House, Judis and Teixeira argued that demographic and political trends were converging in such a way as to form a ­natural-majority coalition for Democrats.

The Republican Party had increasingly found itself confined to white voters, especially those lacking a college degree and rural whites who, as Obama awkwardly put it in 2008, tend to “cling to guns or religion.” Meanwhile, the Democrats had ­increased their standing among whites with graduate degrees, particularly the growing share of secular whites, and remained dominant among racial minorities. As a whole, Judis and Teixeira noted, the electorate was growing both somewhat better educated and dramatically less white, making every successive election less favorable for the GOP. And the trends were even more striking in some key swing states. Judis and Teixeira highlighted Colorado, Nevada, and Arizona, with skyrocketing Latino populations, and Virginia and North Carolina, with their influx of college-educated whites, as the most fertile grounds for the expanding Democratic base.

Obama’s victory carried out the blueprint. Campaign reporters cast the election as a triumph of Obama’s inspirational message and cutting-edge organization, but above all his sweeping win reflected simple demography. Every year, the nonwhite proportion of the electorate grows by about half a percentage point—meaning that in every presidential election, the minority share of the vote increases by 2 percent, a huge amount in a closely divided country. One measure of how thoroughly the electorate had changed by the time of Obama’s election was that, if college-­educated whites, working-class whites, and minorities had cast the same proportion of the votes in 1988 as they did in 2008, Michael Dukakis would have, just barely, won. By 2020—just eight years away—nonwhite voters should rise from a quarter of the 2008 electorate to one third. In 30 years, nonwhites will outnumber whites.

Now, there are two points to keep in mind about the emerging Democratic majority. The first is that no coalition is permanent. One party can build a majority, but eventually the minority learns to adapt to an altered landscape, and parity returns. In 1969, Kevin Phillips, then an obscure Nixon-­administration staffer, wrote The Emerging Republican Majority, arguing that Republicans could undo FDR’s New Deal coalition by exploiting urban strife, the unpopularity of welfare, and the civil-rights struggle to pull blue-collar whites into a new conservative bloc. The result was the modern GOP. Bill Clinton appropriated some elements of this conservative coalition by rehabilitating his party’s image on welfare and crime (though he had a little help from Ross Perot, too). But it wasn’t until Obama was elected that a Democratic president could claim to be the leader of a true majority party.

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We're not easily offended and don't want people to think they have to walk on eggshells around here (like at another place that shall remain nameless) but of course, there is a limit to everything.

In 1969, Kevin Phillips, then an obscure Nixon-­administration staffer, wrote The Emerging Republican Majority, arguing that Republicans could undo FDR’s New Deal coalition by exploiting urban strife, the unpopularity of welfare, and the civil-rights struggle to pull blue-collar whites into a new conservative bloc.

I’ll take a stab at it. I969 was on the Heels
of LBJ’S Great Society, which was pretty much war
on the “White” Middle Class & Blue Collar Whites
were subject to special ridicule.
Radical “kids” were protesting in the streets
& the campuses were up for grabs, at least until
Kent Stste.
Blue Collar Whites were angry & alienated and ripe for
the GOP.

@ waldensianspirit:
Michelle is one bitter gal. She complained about
writing a weak SAT as a high school senior, like
it was somebody elses fault.
Between the two, they have a lot of racially driven
hate.

Obama does loathe Netanyahu. I think that
he has his pastors disdain for Jews.

He may have Wright’s dislike of Jews—it would not be surprising.

On a visceral level, however, he is almost certainly diminished and infuriated by the fact that Netanyahu is immune to the charm that has gotten him everything he has, and infuriated also by the fact that Netanyahu, by refusing to be cowed by Obama’s wonderfulness, shows Obama himself what a cheap and hollow thing that wonderfulness is.

Netanyahu is in many ways a political gasbag. But he has nonetheless seen military service, has several times run a small country in a very rough neighborhood, and can stand up for his country and speak clearly without a teleprompter and without stammering. He is, in other words, someone with real achievements that have been fought for in the real world, not an empty cardboard cutout propped up by other people’s money and a lot of cheap rhetoric.

Obama, in Netanyahu’s presence, has to feel himself confronted for being the hollow fraud he is. Irrespective of his attitude towards Jews in general (probably bad) and his attitude towards Israel (dislike at the best of times) he has to hate Netanyahu for forcing himself to see himself for what he really is.

@ buzzsawmonkey:
I agree with that. I think that Obama feels small in
the presense of Bibi.
He can’t afford the luxury of being taken with
Obamas fabulousness, he is more concerned with
the survival of his nation

I have a sneaking suspicion we’re gonna see the Divine Dufus blow up during the debates. This chump has never, ever, ever had to defend his record before and if his irritation at Jake Tapper during pressers is any indication, we’re in for some glorious fireworks. This is not going to be a hand-picked pro-Bammy crowd – there will be detractors in the audience and when he doesn’t hear anything but laughter and applause, he’s going to have a hard time containing himself. And not having a teleprompter to feed him the script written by the czars is going to really fuel it.

My real regret is that my choice for panelist, Andrew Breitbart, won’t be able to participate (and I nominate Dana Loesch in his place).

My computer—slated for replacement—is just old enough to not be able to run the Flash that will allow me to see that. Oh, well. No surprise, though; I’ve heard the Silver Tongue of the South Side go all flannelmouth before.

That’s part of the reason the GOP is scared to go all out for the Hispanic vote. They fear that if they make a serious effort, it will alienate part of their base. By bringing in Blue Collar Dems, those Dems turned Republicans never gave up some of the racialist attitude of the Democrats. So they hate Hispanics because they view us as inferior or competitors. The Republican Party has traditionally been against this mentality, but by bringing in ex Democrats, they have to cater to this crowd.

That’s why people who are Old Republicans are more tolerant as oppose to those who are Ex Democrat.

I have a sneaking suspicion we’re gonna see the Divine Dufus blow up during the debates. This chump has never, ever, ever had to defend his record before and if his irritation at Jake Tapper during pressers is any indication, we’re in for some glorious fireworks.

That’s why I hope the nominee is Newt Gingrich. Newt could make Obama cry.

If Obama had to face off against Newt Gingrich, he’d be whimpering in fetal position half way through the debate—if he didn’t stalk off in an “Emperor is Displeased” huff.

Why do you think none of the leftist media will give Gingrich the time of day? The last thing that the Obamanoids want is to have the Boy King face off against someone who can actually think and speak on his feet.

I have a sneaking suspicion we’re gonna see the Divine Dufus blow up during the debates. This chump has never, ever, ever had to defend his record before and if his irritation at Jake Tapper during pressers is any indication, we’re in for some glorious fireworks. This is not going to be a hand-picked pro-Bammy crowd – there will be detractors in the audience and when he doesn’t hear anything but laughter and applause, he’s going to have a hard time containing himself. And not having a teleprompter to feed him the script written by the czars is going to really fuel it.

My real regret is that my choice for panelist, Andrew Breitbart, won’t be able to participate (and I nominate Dana Loesch in his place).

@ waldensianspirit:
My computer—slated for replacement—is just old enough to not be able to run the Flash that will allow me to see that. Oh, well. No surprise, though; I’ve heard the Silver Tongue of the South Side go all flannelmouth before.

Wish you could see it. Pretty much illustrates your analysis above. Netanyahu is sitting right next to him and the tension is tense^3. Obama’s tells are telling. Then Netanyahu speaks without a tick or stammer and publicly tightens what he’s there this week to tell Obama. Obama isn’t liking it one bit.

Netanyahu gives him some kindness by thanking him for many things including hospitality this weekend. Giving Obama assurance he won’t be hit for anything like last time if he behaves is the underlying current. And Netanyahu sets in place again exactly what he intends. He doesn’t ask Obama for anything.

Frankly he looks photoshopped in. I’m not saying he is, but he looks it.

He’s not in the center of the room, he projects no air of command, he doesn’t have a computer in front of him or papers in his hands. He looks like he’s wondering when Hillary will send him out for coffee.